Barcelona in winter

tragic departure and tragic arrival...

Departure from Malpensa (Milan)....scheduled time in the afternoon....actual departure....2:00 AM at night....no comment. We flew with Spanair......after a thousand hours of waiting at the airport......in the middle of the night we leave. We arrive at our destination at 3:30 AM and....the icing on the cake....nobody comes to pick us up, even though it was an organized trip!! so no transfer to the hotel. At that point the only salvation in the middle of the night is a taxi. I, along with Laura, join up with other unlucky people staying at our same hotel....off we go.....we arrive at the hotel at 4:00 in the morning of 01/03/04. Nice trip...really nice!!

first day

Breakfast around nine...considering we'd fallen asleep at 5 in the morning....during breakfast we meet 2 Italian girls who we basically join for the entire duration of the stay....Anna and Gloria, from Lombardy, our companions on this Spanish adventure. We leave the hotel toward the metro....to reach one of Barcelona's main squares....from which we take an Open Bus organized to show the city's highlights. Obviously we don't want to miss seeing Barcelona, we go up to the upper deck and the not-too-harsh weather allows us to endure 3 hours of guided tour. So we discover the city's main beauties. Lunch along the Rambla, obviously we immediately taste the original Paella.....delicious! After lunch a long and relaxing walk along the entire Rambla, all the way to the port.

Photos and more photos, comments, lots of people, shopping, video recording and a bit of getting to know Anna and Gloria......We take in the beauties of the famous Rambla, including the Hard Rock Cafe. Taxi......hotel......a little refreshment. Undeterred, we go out again being careful not to get ourselves killed or kidnapped....4 girls alone in Barcelona at night, it wasn't the best. We go hunting for a restaurant that had been highly recommended to us, we find it, we have dinner.....spectacular! Wonderful place, delicious dinner, very low average cost, excellent service!!!! nothing better.

After dinner we roam around the Rambla some more but shortly before midnight we realize the situation is becoming unbearable.....few people around despite it being a fairly festive period....tramps, groups of youths, it's cold and we're on foot and tired.....ok, we decide: taxi...girls, back to the fold!! Calm and restful night....in the very cozy hotel.

spain.....here we come.....

Hearty breakfast, metro, Plaza Catalunya, we set about retracing one by one the points seen from the bus the day before.....from Gaudi's works to an extended visit of the Sagrada Familia....the film rolls go like water, we walk the whole blessed day up and down the city using the metro at times. for lunch, we stop at a small restaurant near the famous Gaudi houses and eat chapas. chapas is a typical way of having lunch for Barcelonans, they're all small tastings and mini courses of first courses, second courses, sides, on small plates.....you order at least 4 or 5 to make a complete meal.....from miniature sausages to octopus salad to vegetables, to typical Spanish courses. to finish in style...crema catalana. aside from a few treats, the Rambla seems to magnetize us and along the famous street the street artists pose for photos.

full of people in the afternoon and we reach the port again, which we take in properly. dinner at the usual magnificent restaurant......and after a stop at the Hard Rock Cafe. when we return to the hotel, late at night, in the lobby we make friends with an Italian guy who's a bit tipsy and fresh from a dinner with friends, who tells us his life's adventures and misadventures.....

organized trip

right from the morning we leave by coach for a little trip around Barcelona, a trip organized and given to us by the tour operator to make up for not having come to pick us up at the airport the first night.....we thus visit Park Guell, the port, some magnificent areas of the city including the stadium, the belvedere, again the Sagrada Familia, the residential areas, squares and monuments otherwise impossible to visit.... in the afternoon we return to the hotel and get ready for the evening. dinner at the usual place, by now we won't give it up for a hundred dollars.....we decide to go see a Spanish dance show....in a place that at first glance seems very much like a nightclub.....the flamenco we watch captivates us for about twenty minutes, after which only the city streets await and welcome us festively.

a big celebration on January 5 in Barcelona as it's the day before January 6, Epiphany, which for them is a very important holiday, almost like Christmas for us...

last day

We wander around the more or less crowded areas of Barcelona from the morning on....everyone is celebrating and the shops are closed. Once we reach the port we'd like to take a catamaran tour of the port.....las golondrinas.....but no luck, everyone is celebrating and so everything is closed!! After a quick lunch and the last photographs along the Rambla and a few shopping centres that stay open, we head back to the hotel where they're waiting for us to leave for the airport. We arrive sad and tired and after check-in we wait for the Spainair flight to Milan. A delay is announced in this case too, damn.....the office awaits me tomorrow. After going back and forth, at 11 p.m.

we leave Barcelona and we don't have much time to brood over the happy holiday.....turbulence ahead!! After twenty minutes of.....pure terrrore, we can't wait to arrive.....technical stopover in Bologna......we arrive in Milan and the freezing temperature makes itself felt right away!! Goodbye Barce!